Hissy Fit .. Bear with me please.

I don't think we got over 40 degrees today.......No ice no snow but very close to me.

LOL at this thread. Its not like we live in Minnesota or Winnipeg...I think we are a little wimpy here in the "South".....!!!

LOL, It feels colder than it would in WInnepeg. The dampness is chilling and our homes are not as well insulated as they would be up north. Also, we have heat pumps down here, the worst invention ever. Mine blows cold air until it warms up.

It is Thursday the 13th and we might be setting a record for LOWS tonight - 21. My backyard is still quite snowy but the front (which gets the sun) has cleared up. At least I can forget the irrigation system for a few days. Supposedly, we will warm up over the weekend and then get rain with higher temps. It is beautiful, as long as the power is on. I did have to get a fan motor replaced in my heat pump yesterday but at least there was still power. This is my third snow in less than two months (one was in Old Salem, NC). I thought it was funny that Farmer's Almanac has been more accurate than NOAA! As with hurricanes, be prepared! In SC, if you don't like the weather, wait five minutes and it will change - as says my daughter in law. She grew up here. I may have to go to a volunteer job in the morning - with four inches of snow still on the roof! At least I have been getting inside jobs done and reading those garden catalogs! What more could you want?? Marilyn

I don't think we are wimpy .. it's just that like Alice said, our homes aren't really built for extended periods of really cold weather. Also we don't have the proper clothes!

I lived in the frozen north during my college days, terre haute indiana .. was a real culture shock for a south florida girl .. the first winter I was there they had a blizzard with snow accumulation in feet, not inches.

Just the opposite occurred when I moved to england in july of 1997 .. they were having a heat wave .. highs in the upper 80's to mid 90's .. people were dropping like flies. Their summer is usually like our spring .. they don't have air conditioning or clothes for that kind of heat. I, of course didn't even break a sweat.

It's all a matter of what you are used to and prepared for.

X

Well, I do have to agree about the heat pump and insulation....as I touch my toes to my icy floor, with only the hardwood between me and my unheated basement.
This does beg the question, though.....why don't we all have better insulation for the HEAT? Feeling the cold, has definitely got me thinking about how much heat comes in, the rest of the year...a bit eye-opening...

No basements down here and we do have our floor heavily insulated from the crawl space but it is still cold and damp. My neighbor, who moved here from Alaska, says she has never felt so cold in her life.

It is an eye opener thinking about all the heat that can infiltrate our homes. We are looking into having that foam spray applied to the underside of the roof in the attic. I am told that works very well but I suspect it is very expensive. Just have to weigh the details. That should help to keep the heat in during the winter also.

Looks like we should have at least 10 frost free days down here, keeping my fingers crossed.

When I got a new roof last year they put a ridge vent in it and I was amazed that my cooling bills were 10 dollars less than usual .. I'm sure it was the ridge vent that made the difference.

I'm on a slab which is the temp of the ground which is cold this time of year and that adds to the problem. You can feel the difference in temperature from a couple of inches off the floor to 3 feet off the floor and up by the ceiling is a different temp. LOL. During hot weather it works to my advantage but goes against me when it's cold. If I ever build another house I'm going with a gas furnace for sure and boiler systems that run tubes through the floor sound like a good idea too. Probably total over kill for my area but it would make winter much more enjoyable. http://www.energysavers.gov/your_home/space_heating_cooling/index.cfm/mytopic=12590 That what I'm talking about.

When it was time to replace our heat pumps we looked into a gas furnace but we would need a huge propane tank and burying something that large is not easy when the water table is so high (and it would have to be buried in my neighborhood.) Also, because it would have to be propane, we learned the monthly bills would be astronomical.

I think the heated floor would be wonderful around here.

And we have a wet humid cold here where in the west its a dry cold even when it snows

Lavina

the outdoor well pump wouldn't start yesterday after filling the hot tub and I was like what? I just used it...thankfully today Branden found out it was a loose wire at the outside turn on junction...after xmas and me still not finding employment here in Sumter I was like great just what we need having to replace one of two well pumps...anyways...I am sooo ready for that groundhog not to see his shadow...but then again - who wouldn't run and hide with 500 people watching you and cheering...LOL

My husband, who grew up in Phila, always says his coldest winter was when he was stationed at Jacksonville's Mayport Naval station back in the 70's.

Today' s paper mentions that the Lowcountry temps, since Dec.1st, have been 22% colder than last winter and 48% colder than the historical average. No wonder I am shivering - although we are having a heat wave, it is 44 this morning. ;-)

Yesterday afternoon was great almost reached 60 - I cleaned up and got all the dead stuff out of the ginger bed in the back yard, but it looks like I've probably lost all of my costus. Even the crinum look unhappy. Bummer.